1 Unit: Civil Rights Era Student led strikes against school segregation NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshops for School Teachers Long Road to Brown: School Desegregation in VA, July 2015 Submitted by Lauren Wells Introduction: The Civil Rights movement in United States history textbooks throughout the country is often told through flash points between 1954 with the Brown v. Board of Education decision ultimately culminating with the 1964 and 1965 passages of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts respectively. Moments such as the freedom summer, violence in Birmingham, Alabama and March on Washington are often staple discussions and lessons in Civil Rights units. However, this is a limiting representation of the Civil Rights Movement. While these are significant moments that should not be overlooked, students are presented a limited view of the scope and legacy of the civil rights movement. Histories such as struggles with school desegregation beyond the 1954 timeline are often missing from curriculums. This lesson seeks to highlight a significant region and moment in the Civil Rights Movement, Virginia s plight with school desegregation and the history of Barbara Johns and Moton High School s role in the desegregation of Virginia Public Schools. In response to the deplorable conditions of the segregated school facilities that Black students in Prince Edward County in Virginia (a trend that can also be seen nationally), Barbara Johns, a Junior at Moton High School led a strike against these conditions in 1951. This sparked a countywide effort to equalize the schools, leading to the eventual support of the NAACP. Gaining the attention of Virginia-based NAACP lawyers, Oliver Hill and Spotswood Robinson, Barbara Johns and the student s protest over school conditions became the Davis v. Prince Edward County, a case that would eventually be bundled into one of the five cases in Brown v. Board of Education. This lesson uses local history to tell a national story, focusing on how the contributions of one can and does impact the lives of others in an attempt to broaden the scope and spectrum of the Civil Rights Era in American history. Guiding (Compelling) questions Why did students and their parents want to fight for equal opportunities in education? How far is one willing to go to achieve their goals? Learning Objectives: Using both photographic and oral history primary source evidence, students will be able to discuss and analyze why students and parents protested and fought for integration during the Civil Rights Era. Students will be able to debate and discuss the legacy and impact of school integration movements reflecting on the importance of desegregation movements throughout the country. Common Core State Standards: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.1: Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources, connecting insights gained from specific details to an understanding of the text as a whole
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.2: Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary that makes clear the relationships among the key details and ideas. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.6: Evaluate authors' differing points of view on the same historical event or issue by assessing the authors' claims, reasoning, and evidence. New Jersey State Standards: 6.1.12.D.14.b: Assess the effectiveness of actions taken to address the causes of continuing urban tensions and violence. 6.1.12.D.14.d: Evaluate the extent to which women, minorities, individuals with gender preferences, and individuals with disabilities have met their goals of equality in the workplace, politics, and society. 6.1.12.B.14.b: Analyze how regionalization, urbanization, and suburbanization have led to social and economic reform movements in New Jersey and the United States. Background: On May 17 th, 1954 The Supreme Court of the United States declared: We conclude hat in the field of Public Education, the Doctrine of Separate but Equal has no place. In many classrooms and curriculums throughput the country, this is the starting point for what history and those who study it call the Civil Rights Era. In reality and practice, however, this is only the beginning of the story. This lesson looks at how Brown happened and looks to study the legacy and impact of student led desegregation movements around the nation that officially made the 1954 decision occur. While the Brown v. Topeka Kansas Case was an integral moment in the fight for the desegregation of schools nationally, it certainly was not the only one. A prominent case in Virginia, Davis v. School Board of Prince Edward County helped to desegregate schools throughout the state. Barbara Johns, a Junior at the R.R. Moton high school in Farmville, Virginia felt that her dilapidated conditions of her segregated school lacked the educational, extracurricular, and physical amenities and facilities at the white schools in the county. Gathering the supports of her peers and classmates, Barbara Johns led the student body on strike and protested for equal treatment and facilities in Prince Edward County. Her and her fellow classmates spoke loud enough for the local chapter of the NAACP to hear and together, along with Oliver Hill and Spotswood Robinson, NAACP lawyers they fought for desegregation of schools in the county and won. While this is only the beginning of Virginia s long and tumultuous history with school desegregation, the Davis v. School Board of Prince Edward County is an important moment for students to not only learn, but connect with. Every time I write a lesson, I like to discuss what students can gain by studying this content and what skills they are taking away from participating in this lesson. I have centered this lesson on two compelling questions: Why did students and their parents want to fight for equal opportunities in education and, How far is one willing to go to achieve their goals? With these two questions, I hope my students gain two important skills and mores to help them navigate through the history curriculum and life beyond my doors. First skill is historical perspective. I believe it is important for student to gain a sense of the individuals impacted during that time area, not just in a linear one dimensional sense, but really grasp and understand who was involved and how they were shaped and impacted by the events and ideologies around them. This skill can be found in the opener and assessment activities. The second skill that my lesson focuses on is developing interpersonal relationships and social skills. I firmly believe 2
3 that as a social science educator that one of the main goals in the classroom is for students to learn how to interact with diversity, difference, and variety. Talking with others and getting to know one for their history and perspective is the core of any well done historical analysis and research, and should be the core of any history classroom. Developing these communication and interpersonal skills can be seen in the oral history and monument activities. Preparation and resources: Worksheet 1: do now activity Worksheet 2: Oral history analysis graphic organizer Worksheet 3: Exit ticket (monument analysis) Sources used throughout the lesson Photographs of RR Moton School o http://www.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/121brown/121visual2.htm o http://www.pbs.org/beyondbrown/history/photogallery1_08.html o http://www.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/121brown/121visual1.htm Photographs of the Barbara John s monument in Richmond, Virginia Oliver Hill interview: http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/voices/id/5 Raymond H. Boone interview: http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/voices/id/0/rec/1 John A. Stokes interview: http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/voices/id/10/rec/10 Elizabeth Cooper and Jane Cooper Johnson Interview: http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/voices/id/1/rec/2 Lesson Activities: This is a one-day lesson in the middle of a unit on the Civil Rights Era. This lesson has been created for a 60-minute block, with extension activities at the end of the lesson plan. This lesson would be located in the approximate middle of a unit on the civil rights era. Such topics such as nonviolent protests, origins of the civil rights movements, Martin Luther King and the March on Washington, and Brown v. Board. This lesson would then be followed with a discussion on the little rock 9, Malcolm X and the rise of Black Nationalism, and the post-civil Rights era case study of the Race Riots in Newark, New Jersey. Introduction 5-10 minutes: Students will be presented with four different pictures of segregated schools in Prince Edward County Virginia. Using the primary source photographs, students will write and then verbally discuss differences between the African American schools and their own. In the space provided below the pictures, students will answer the following questions: o In the photos provided, compare these images to to your own school. What would be the challenges of someone going to school in those conditions? o How would you personally be impacted by the conditions of this learning environment? Write your analysis in the space provided below Have students discuss their findings in a whole group discussion. Oral History Primary source analysis: 35-40 minutes
Students will be broken up into groups, no more than 5 students large. (Note: split the groups according to class size and ability levels. I usually split the groups up according to learning styles/needs and behavioral issues but the format is up to teacher discussion) Have these groups set up before time to save time. In their groups, students will be given an oral history to listen to. Students may go out into the hallway in order to listen to the interview. Together, students will assign one student to be the scribe and will then complete the oral history graphic organizer as a group. Interviews range in (25-35 minutes.) Students will answer the following questions: o What is the tone/mood of the recording? o What time period/event/historical era is your interviewee discussing? o What is the major focus of this discussion? o Whose oral history are you taking/listening to? o What is the date of this recording/interview? o What was occurring in the United States at the time of this interview? o List (at least) five new facts about this time period that you have gained from listening to this interview: o Why do you think the original broadcast was made and for what audience? o What evidence in the recording helps you to know why it was made? o Write at least two questions that you would have asked your interviewee if you had the opportunity to discuss this history with them in person. o What information do you gain about this event that would not be conveyed in a textbook or other written source? In a whole group setting, students will then discuss the facts they learned from their interviewee and discuss the questions they would have liked to ask this interviewee had they had the opportunity to talk in person. (10 minutes) Debriefing activity: (5-10 minutes) Monument Analysis ~ 5-10 minutes Using pictures from the Barbara Johns monument in Richmond, Virginia, students will analyze the monument using the following questions. This exit ticket can be located on Worksheet 3. o What does this monument say about school desegregation movements? o What can visitors to this monument learn about the issues with school desegregation in Virginia? o Why do you think school desegregation movements nation wide are commemorated using monuments? 4 Assessment: For their final assessment on the school desegregation movement, students will complete a journaling reflection. This can be handed in typed or hand written format (Note: I use an on-line drop box for handing in assessments). This journaling reflection should be at least 1.5 pages long and follow conventional formats. Using the facts information obtained in class, students will answer the following questions: o With this information, how are you going to use what happened in Farmville, Virginia and throughout the Civil Rights Era in your own life?
o Do you have any personal experiences with discrimination or prejudice in your own life? How have you dealt with it? Extending the Lesson: Historical Perspective writing: After examining the textual and photographic primary sources, have students write in the perspective of a student who was enduring the segregated conditions to their local school board advocating for integration of schools. Students should use at least five facts from class to write their persuasive letter to the School Board, advocating for integration in schools. Having students create a monument to commemorate the student-led protests. Students will build a memorial based on the research they have done on the protest movements of school integration during the Civil Rights Movement. This can be a 3D model or hand drawn. Computer models are acceptable as well if you first run it by the teacher. Students will then write a one-paragraph description about why students chose to build the memorial you did and how the monument commemorates the history of school desegregation movements. Students should use 5-8 facts learned in class as well as reference primary sources discussed and analyzed in class. The paragraph about the memorial should be typed. Format: 12-point font, Times New Roman (or comparable font) one inch margins, 1-2 pages in length. Current Events Connection: since the fifty/sixty year anniversary of the Brown decision, there have been many articles arguing that school districts across the country have been battling against the legacies and impacts of the integration movement, many experiencing de-facto segregation. In a Socratic Seminar/persuasive essay, have students debate and trace the legacies of school desegregation, ultimately debating the difference between desegregation and integration and whether or not these school integration movements achieved their goal. The article below is a New Jersey example of such an article: o http://www.northjersey.com/news/education/rutgers-study-compares-racial-divide-in-n-jschools-to-apartheid-1.637261 o http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/04/six_decades_after_brown_vs_board_of_educat ion_njs_schools_are_still_segregated_opinion.html Worksheet 1: Lesson Starter: Examine the four photographs. Discuss differences between the African American schools in the photos below to your own school. 5
6 What would be the challenges of someone going to school in those conditions? How would you personally be impacted by the conditions of this learning environment?
7 How do these classroom/school conditions compare to your own school? Worksheet 2: Oral History analysis *adapted from the National History Archives graphic organizer. Part II: Listening 1. What is the tone/mood of the recording? 2. What time period/event/historical era is your interviewee discussing? 3. What is the major focus of this discussion? Part I: contextualizing the source: 1. Whose oral history are you taking/listening to? 2. What is the date of this recording/interview? 3. What was occurring in the United States at the time of this interview?
Part III: Interview Analysis: 1. List (at least) five new facts about this time period that you have gained from listening to this interview: a. 8 b. c. d. e. 2. Why do you think the original broadcast was made and for what audience? 3. What evidence in the recording helps you to know why it was made? 4. Write at least two questions that you would have asked your interviewee if you had the opportunity to discuss this history with them in person. 5. What information do you gain about this event that would not be conveyed in a textbook or other written source?
9 Worksheet 3: Exit ticket Using pictures from the Barbara Johns monument in Richmond, Virginia, students will analyze the monument using the following questions. This exit ticket can be located on Worksheet 3. What does this monument say about school desegregation movements? What can visitors to this monument learn about the issues with school desegregation in Virginia? Why do you think school desegregation movements nation wide are commemorated using monuments?
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